There are many situations where it is necessary to contact an end of an optical fiber with another object. For example, before splicing two optical fibers together, their ends must be aligned and placed in contact with one another. Caution must be exercised as the ends are moved into a position where they contact one another so that the ends do not collide with too great a force thereby damaging them. However, it is necessary to provide enough force upon the ends at fusion, a time at which the ends are molten, to ensure some overrun of the fiber ends. If on the other hand, the ends are loosely coupled, they will pull apart in the instance of fusion, resulting in a poor splice joint. While some commercially available fusion splicers have an overrun mechanism that can physically advance the fibers to ensure overrun, the mechanism is bulky, complicated and expensive, and relies on operator visual inspection and/or video image processing for initial placement of the fiber ends.
One of the most common ways of positioning two optical fiber ends near, or in contact with one another, for fusion splicing, uses a visual aid such as a microscope to assist an operator in manually performing this task. U.S. Pat. No. 5,002,351 entitled Fusion Splicer for Optical Fibers, in the name of the applicant Murray R. Harman and Attila J. Szanto, issued Mar. 26, 1991, describes such a system including a microscope for placement of optical fiber ends in contact before fusion. In other more complex systems microprocessor driven video imaging is provided for positioning optical fiber ends.
Other methods and devices for connecting (splicing) or contacting optical fibers are known, for instance from U.S. Pat. No. 4,049,414 to Smith, 4,199,223 to Yannoni, 4,906,810 to Sharma, 4,978,431 to Clark et al, 4,598,669 (Steinmann et al) 4,964,689 (Wichansky), and 4,220,394 (Tardy).
Although these systems do in some manner, perform their intended function, they are expensive and sometimes contribute to inadequate, inconsistent splice joints. Moreover, these and other visually based systems produce results that may vary with the level of an operator's skill.
Therefore, it is an object of this invention, to provide a system that yields repeatable uniform results independent of an operator's skill level.
It is another object of the invention to provide a system for placing an optical fiber in contact with another object wherein the force applied therebetween is less than or equal to a predetermined amount of force.
It is yet another object of the invention to provide a means of micro-positioning optical fiber ends in contact without visual interaction and without image processing.